Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1887-08-26
The Thugs Of India.

lOOIA0y% 4IOAA DOAOsSY LV|Oe1ACubV0s
now that you've seen the ruins Of
the Hindu citadel, and been over the
native cantonment, and visited the
temple on the hill yonder, and gone
round the marble rocks of the Ner-
buddha, there's nothing left for you to
see here except the Thugs"
''Who are these Thugs, anyhow.
asks the American, as we move on
agnin. II just know that they're al
ways numbering people, and that's all
l do know
"Well," said 7, "most OF what I
know comes from Colonel Slieman and
Colonel Meadows Taylor, who were
the chief agents in putting them down.
The original system, ages ago, was
simply continual human sacrifice to
Kali, the goddess of murder, from
whom Calcutta (Kai.Kuttah, or
Kali's Temple) took it's name. The
theory was that the earth was over
peopled, and that Kali's servants,
the Thugs, had to clear off the super
fuous population by a little judicious
mudering every now and then. So
whenever they could way lay any
man in a lonely place, they strangled
him with a silk handkerchief, and
then buried him; and this they called
the good work."
81 wonder what they'd call bad
work, then" mutters my companion.
"WeN. this went on for ages upon
ages, without any one having the least
suspicion of it. Men kept disappear
ing here and there, and nobody
knew how. At first the murders were
simply a religious rite, without any
er-thought of plumber, but after.
wards they began to combine 70 bbery
with murder, and to pick out as VIC
Tins those who were worth plumber
ing. However, the English had been in
India for years before anyone dream
ed that 'Thuggee' existed. At last q
Thug chief, being under sentence fo:
some crime, betrayed his comrades
to save his own life, and then the
whole story came out and the Thugs
were seized and imprisoned. At first
the British commissioner of the dis
trict where the discovery was made
wouldn't believe that all these hor-
rors could have been going on so long
without being found out, but when
the old chief dug up thirteen skeletons
on the very spot where the commits
sioner's tent YVES pitched he began to
change his mind. But here we are
at the place"
We halt suddenly before a. tall,
gray, gloomy building, at the. door Of
which announce myself as O. news
paper correspondent, and we are at
once admitted, although the hindoo
ian:tor looks with no small wonder at
Mrs. Ker as she enters and asks
whether the bibi logue (lady) is a cor
respondent too.
On the other side OF the road stands
a high bamboo palisade, above which
peer the grass thatches OF a, number
OF tiny native huts. The one narrow
entrance OF this enclosure is guarded
by magnificent Sikh soldier-tall,
strong and shapely as bronze stat
ne of Hercules-whose bold. swarthy
face and keen black eyes look very
picturesque beneath his crimson tur-
ban. After exchanging a word or two
with our conductor, he steps back
with O. military salute to let us pass
in, and the next moment we are
standing amid the most formidable
gang of murderers upon the face OF
the earth.
The theory that every man wears
on his countenance the stamp OF his
nature is. true only within certain
limits. Many OF the great criminals
whom have seen bore in their faces
terrible warning of what they were
but with the Thugs OF Japabur it is
not so. These human vampires who
now gather round ME, every one Of
whom has taken more lives than
any public executioner in Europe, are
to the outward eye B. set Of q quiet,
slouching, n,eagre old men, who might
be a gang OF beggars. a group Of harm
less village folk, q party Disappearance
ated native workmen, or anything ON
earth but what they really are.
'tThat's the chief" whispers my
guide, pointing to a small, lean, gray
beard with g. white turban, who is sit
ting before the nearest hut rocking q
child on his knee, and stroking its thin
little brown face with the hand that
shed the blood of his fellow men like
water.
"Ask him." rejoin I, chow many
murders he has committed"
A momentary gleam OF cunning
wrinkles in the sunken eyes. The old
tiger is evidently suspicious, and
stands on his guard.
II can not tell" he answers, with An
Indifference which, under such cir
cumstances, has in it somethingghast-
ly; II didn't keep count OF them be-
yond hundred" >.
pretty we'll - mutters the lnspec-
tor, but Colonel Taylor's prisoner,
Ameer Ali owned to TOO"
"He must have been a nice young
man, that Ameer ALL" observed l.
.You remember his saying, ''Wefinaly
decided to MURDER the men directly at
ter our evening prayers.
Just then noticed that the line Of
howell has gap in it every here and
there, as il g. hut had fallen or been
pulled down, and the Ins pector tells
me, with look Of unwopted awe upon
his bold blue face. that whenever one
of these wretches dies his house is In
stantly razed to the ground. IS il to
efface his very memory from the
earth.
"Now, before we co." says ! to our
conductor. Imean to see: for myself
how the strangling was. done. Oblige
me by telling this man to; put his
moose round my wrist, for I don't
care to trust him with my throat"
The savage eaeerness with which
the withered old skeleton obeys
the cali-as ], If filed with
fresh lie by even the make. believe
show of MURDERS fearful to see.
Knotting small coin into the corner
Of his handkerchief to give him g sure